Global biodiversity protection requires the development of protected areas that include
representative samples of different ecosystems and their associated biodiversity
(Dudley 1992, Scott et al. 2001a). I compared long-term decline and protection of
forests in three major biomes; boreal, temperate and tropical. I found that forests in the
temperate biome are less abundant and less protected than forests in the boreal and
tropical biomes. I conducted regional analyses for five continents on the degree of
protection of temperate forests across naturally occurring geographic and elevational
ranges. My results indicate that protected temperate forests do not represent the full
geographic and elevational range of naturally occurring temperate forests. Bias in
location, elevation and slope of protected areas are present at both the regional and
global scale. Better protection of temperate forests is needed if the diversity and
resources associated with these forests types across their geographic range is to be
preserved.

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